Wednesday, May 12, 2010

7 Reasons I like critical theory

As a free-range scholar & educator, I tend to go off course a bit occasionally (well - maybe more than occasionally). I've recently re-discovered Critical Theory when preparing a guest lecture for Bianca Beetson's Indigenous Art, Protocols and Practice unit at Queensalnd College of Art - Griffith University.

7 Reasons to Like Critical Theory

1) It challenges accepted truths & norms, it asks you to dig beneath the surface.
2) It criqitues privilege & power, especially hidden power (like that which is racialised & gendered)
3) At its core is the concept of liberation & democratisation.
4) It assumes that there are no single truths and no absolutes.
5) Critical theory asks/demands that you become aware of yourself as knower/viewer.
6) Encourages you to get into action - don't just sit & watch the world - seek change & transformation - it gives you a framework to "be in the world.
7) It can form a framework for your practice regardless of what your field is - art, education, research, mathematics, science.

Wanna know more - check out these writers (in alphabetical order NOT importance)
*
Sara Ahmed
Richard Cary
Marylin Frankenstein
Paola Freire
Henry Giroux
Ghassan Hage
bell hooks
Martin Nakata
Karen Martin
Aileen Moreton-Robinson
proppaNOW
Edward Said
bell hooks
* These are the author's I've read - have you got anymore you could share? We'd love to here from you & aslo from examples of educators using critical theory in the classroom.

(Originally posted on criticalclassroom on TypePad on 09/03/2010

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